@horizonknight
Here numbers:
Depth 28: NO UVs + Bonus dmg ( vs construc,jelly,etc)
Storm driver: 178-168 dmg ?(if shock +28, +30 dmg every 3 sec ?)
Nova Driver: 205 dmg, Same dmg than a leaviathan blade.
Umbra driver: 205
Magma driver: 178-168 dmg ? (+status 70 dmg every sec)
Pulsar: 190 Explosive shot dmg ( +status 30, 28 dmg every 3 sec?)
i did not deny that; i said that.
I have to admit, that was a grammatical error on my part. It should say "unless you are truly denying that Alchemers (sans Nova post-buff) have a lower base damage than all Pulsar damage output."
On the flip-side, however, you supported what I was attempting to get across.
In saying so, you thusly denied so.
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Here's a scenario:
Something is red. I know it's red, others know it's red. Yet for some reason, someone says it is blue, and insists on it. I proceed to tell him that it is not blue, but red, because there is a reasonable distinction between the two colors. However, this person continues to say it is blue, and in doing such, is denying that it is clearly red. The individual then goes on to explain by telling us how blue can potentially be purple or green.
_________
This discussion is not about it possibly becoming purple or green, given the correct circumstances, or even gray. It is not about nailing multiple ricochets by aiming your shots particularly to attain the highest possible net-damage, or other various strategies. It is about your statement that "alchemers do more damage than polaris" (again stated here), and my attempt to improve the accuracy and validity of said statement, in that Alchemers have a better potential DPS, not better damage per hit.
Goldmaker here (basically, above) was kind enough to present figures, allowing me to skip the trouble of presenting my own results. It confirms that all applicable Alchemers (sans Nova, again) have a lower base damage than Polaris.
Your rebuttal was a fair try, but it strayed from the aforementioned basis topic by presenting uncorrelated variables and references (multiple hits via ricochet and Umbra Driver), indicating the lack of hard evidence and instead using other abilities/potential effects of the Alchemers to try to push your argument.
I hate Pulsar for one reason; I can't see !@#$ as a swordsmen. And when idiots try and tell me Elemental damage is great against jellies while I'm up there in the heat taking hits for them with my Acheron, I can't help but rage. One of the few things in this game that makes me mad, though ignorance is a HUGE thing in games that pisses me off, and probably the only thing. (It takes like an hour to learn everything you need to know to not piss people off in any MMORPG or MMO type game; learn it so your not an ass and ruin other peoples play time, or go play alone.)
EDIT: And Alchemers suck. They have 2 shots and do jack diddily for damage, and their ricochet damage is crap and completely unpredictable, as they don't follow any real sort of physics. If they broke out more and did a bit more damage, or you had 3 shots per clip, I'd like them more. I always carry 3 swords and 1 gun, and even though I have 2 alchemers, I don't use them except Cryo for PvP utility. Other guns do better, and for both AOE and single target, Polaris is more effective and easier to use.
I'm a pure gunslinger and I carry around 4 guns, Hail Driver Callahan, Umbra Driver, and Polaris, if i had to get rid of one gun it would be the polaris hands down, dont get me wrong its useful, but the damage Potential of the Alchemer series with its ricochet is far far far greater than what the polaris can dish out, the problem with the polaris is this, if theres a tight group and you shoot at it its gonna seperate all the enemies in different directions and you basically have to pick each one off one by one, with alchemers you can circle strafe a large group into a tight ball and aim for the enemies in the middle, and the numbers start flying with ricochet shots, so for large groups, alchemers, and for the few times pushing back is usefull to the team use polaris, and vs gun puppies or picking off single enemies, otherwise if theres 2+ enemies close to each other , alchemers will do sooooo much more damage , and if you cant out damage a polaris, you pretty much cant aim. If the polaris ever gets nerfed I'll see little reason to carry it around.
I really don't understand why are you trying to defend alchemers by insulting people. I don't know about others but i have Magma/Nova/Cryo/Shadow/Volt drivers and generally, i've always had an alchemer with me, they were oh-so-great and stuff but really, its like some people said in this thread - the ricochets aren't really that great.
Whats worse, they mess up totally the Hail Driver, your oh-so-great DPS goes down the gutter because poor you, you can't shot because there is a high chance your oh-so-great ricochets will accidentally destroy the freeze they just created. Thats what you call a useless tool, instead of slowing down the enemy, it slows you down. I'd rather see the freeze on Valiance, would be a nice boost for it.
And Nova's damage isn't that great and i don't know just how are you using Polaris but you can almost infinitely stream projectiles with the line by just twoshoting, stoping and twoshoting again after the gun lowering animation and honestly, how do you outdps Polaris with Nova Driver? I just hope you don't get into the reloading animation
So please do tell, if Polaris does way better in:
- Gun Puppy handling (be it normal, Polyps or Howlitzers)
- groups of monsters (shaping up, knocking into teammates bombs, when monsters are shocked and get hit by shock ticks they get immune to knockback for a small frame of time so you don't even have to worry that much about knockback)
- dealing damage to single target (you can get closer to the enemy and just stream infinitely the projectiles without knocking it back and do at that 3/4 per shot of what a Nova Driver shot would do, you get 3 shots not 2 though, and its actually plausible to never reload, monsters hit by shock ticks are immune to knockback for a small frame of time)
- area denial (because what is more awesome than just blocking the swarm with the explosions)
- shock applying and its abuse (huge splash, excellent ability of shaping up forms [again])
- quicksilvers juggling (a few quicksilver and a bunch of other monsters in a room and you are inside a corridor? great! time to ignite that quicksilver so it can wipe the room for me [this isn't as viable with Storm Driver: no knockback before ignition, the bullets are fast and you might get caught by the berserker quicksilver, slow bullets give Polaris here an upper hand as you can easily get (away) in poisition for defending or generally backpedal while streaming])
Things i think the Drivers do just ok:
- oneshotting Gun Puppies (i don't really need to do that with Polaris since i can just watch as the Gun Puppy tries to shot and doesn't manage to)
- handling Retrodes (due the beam attack [even small knockback can really make things messy) and that only in parties, when soloing it doesn't matter)
The only real problem i have with Polaris is that its explosions/bullets obstruct the view really badly.
Thats all. Really, don't get me wrong, i loved the alchemers but its just, Polaris is way better in many ways. Gotta stop living in the past and move on.
lol, espeonage, you write like a lobotomized lawyer.
here are some screenshots, horizonknight; just quick examples, walking into level 19 and shooting single shots at the first mobs i came across.
http://img824.imageshack.us/img824/2426/alchemerricochet1.jpg
http://img16.imageshack.us/img16/2327/alchemerricochet2.jpg
you can see the third hit flying away from it.
sometimes all three hits connect on a single target.
here's a single shot against a group:
http://img710.imageshack.us/img710/743/alchemerricochet3.jpg
i killed those two retrodes in three shots by the way.
6 numbers often pop up from a single volley at a group.
multiple hits are common with alchemers and it doesn't take many to make one do more damage than polaris.
@Raunwynn eeyup , i always get multiple hits in the same target, people tend to underestimate ricochets.
You're only sealing the discussion in my favor by playing the blame-game; you had nothing intellectual or insightful to reply with, so you decided to regress to a hapless insult that attempts to move the focus away from yourself.
Ah, you've been a laugh Raunwynn. It should be fun seeing you around. ;3
@horizonknight
oh, sure!
i'll try to do that tonight or tomorrow.
i hit several guys just a few minutes ago 3 times for one shot with both umbra driver and magma driver.
it's cool with the firotech line because it almost always applies fire when it happens and the fire hits immediately.
you should be able to test it for yourself with the smaller alchemers too.
if i remember correctly, they all do the internal ricochet.
it's pretty awesome.